


mixed signals

by spookyfoot



Series: amnesty [3]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Humor, M/M, Post War, but i didn't quite get there, season 8 what season 8, so enjoy the banter!, the idea was that james mistakes lance's competitiveness with sexual tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:22:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26077153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookyfoot/pseuds/spookyfoot
Summary: "I don't trust him."“What's not to trust?”“His Dmitiri from Anastasia hair, his cocky attitude, his sim scores, his everything,” Lance says, waving his arms.Veronica sits, a look of realization dawning on her face. “I can’t believe I never put that together--”“Yes thank you, Veronica--”“--he looks exactly like Dmitri from Anastasia. Wow.”“Okay I take it back, you’re not helping.”
Relationships: James Griffin/Lance (Voltron), Keith/Shiro (Voltron), sort of - Relationship
Series: amnesty [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1893115
Comments: 7
Kudos: 58





	mixed signals

**Author's Note:**

> this one...haunts me. i still think james/lance is my best idea IF ONLY I'D GOTTEN THERE

In retrospect, Pidge doesn’t know why Lance and Griffin expected the hoverbike races to be anything other than an elaborate and dusty mating ritual between Shiro and Keith. After all, one of the first things Shiro had done once Keith was up and moving around on his own was uh, _gently encourage_ , the Garrison brass to reinstate Keith’s sim scores. They’d stricken them from the records after his inglorious expulsion.

Shiro had given them his best I’m-not-mad-I’m-just-disappointed-no-actually-I’m-mad-and-just-good-at-hiding-it look and they’d caved almost instantly. It’s not surprising in the least--he’d had a lot of practice using that look on Lance, to great effect.

(“My top score doesn’t count if I didn’t beat Keith’s,” Shiro said sly smile tucked in the corner of his mouth, like a secret only a few could get close enough to reach. Keith had looked up at him from under his lashes with more stars in his eyes than usual--a feat in and of itself--while Shiro curled a big warm hand around his shoulder and everyone else in the room felt like they really just ought to leave them alone because _wow this was intimate, did they really do that in public? Wait they do that all the time?_

The last bit, Pidge heard verbatim a half hushed diatribe from Veronica that left a flurry of nods in its wake.

These people are weak, Pidge has _seen_ and purposefully forgotten more things than these fools could ever imagine.)

//

Matt had managed to get a two seater cruiser and conveniently made it so Pidge was his only passenger. And, well, Pidge knew exactly what that meant.

Gossip.

After needling Matt about his alien girlfriend—a new favorite past time—Matt pulled a hail Mary out of his back pocket to redirect the conversation to only slightly less embarrassing territory.

“So I may have...told some people that Keith and Lance were dating.”

Pidge chokes on her water, “you _what?_ ”

“I thought it would be funny to fuck with with them,” Matt shrugs, but his eyes say _I’m not even a little bit sorry._

“Okay, first of all, if mom found out you cursed in front of me, she’d lose it--”

“Funny how she trusts you to pilot a sentient robot lion but not to hear a curse word--”

“--second, no one who’s seen the way Shiro and Keith look at one another is going to believe that. No one with _eyes_ is going to believe that.”

“Well...I guess the Garrison has a lot of blind pilots then.”

“What the fuck.”

“I know right? How do they even fly like that?”

“ _Matt.”_

“You have to admit it’s pretty funny though.”

“It’s fucking hilarious.”

“ _Katie.”_

“You know I’m right.”

“You are right. And somehow I think it’s only going to get worse.”

//

Shiro’s been reluctant to Keith out of his sight since Keith was cleared to get out of his hospital bed and start helping out with rebuilding Earth’s, well, everything.

Pidge’s pretty sure the only reason that the other Paladins and MFE pilots got invited to join them on what’s clearly a date is because both Shiro and Keith are competitive assholes.

//

Lance casts a long, suspicious glance across the cafeteria. Griffin and the other MFE pilots are making their way over to the Paladins table. Well technically the paladins and Shiro but once a paladin, always a paladin. Plus, Lance knows for a fact that Keith would decapitate anyone who suggested Shiro wasn’t part of the team anymore, intentionally or not, and Lance is pretty fond of his head where it is. On his shoulders.

(“That’s funny,” Pidge says later, when he’s rehashing the whole mess with her over mint chocolate chip milkshakes, “I’m pretty sure your head is actually up your ass.”

“Katherine Holt,” Matt gasps, clutching his hands against his chest, “space has turned you into a heathen!” He’d pauses, then laughs, “no seriously though, Pidge. Good one.”

“I’m glad that you haven’t lost your sense of humor in your old age, Matt.”)

“Why are Griffin and Co. coming over here?” Lance asks Veronica.

Veronica looks at him from under a single raised brow, “the rest of them do have names, you know.”

“Details.

“ _Lance._ ”

“Sorry not sorry, your face was priceless. Rizavi, Kinkade, and Leif are all cool. But Griffin,” Lance stares at him with narrowed eyes, “I don’t trust Griffin.”

Mostly, Lance doesn’t trust how Griffin is looking at Keith. Keith is the leader of Voltron, and Lance is his right-hand man. They’ve bonded. He’s taking this very seriously-at least one of them has to considering Keith hasn’t looked away from Shiro for the entirety of their meal. Or the entire time they’d been in space fighting an alien empire. But, you know, details. At this point, the betting pool on whether those two actually know they’re in a relationship is still going strong and the stakes are high. Even Iverson had thrown in ten dollars with a gruff, “they’re not together yet, Shirogane is absolutely terrible at relationships and Kogane doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing. I give it another year.”

And everyone groaned at the idea of another year of the Will-They-Won’t-They Waltz. Another year of this bullshit and Shiro and Keith had already known each other for at least five. Jesus.

Pidge had just slid a sealed piece of paper into the betting pool with a neatly stacked pile of GAC and a stone-faced promise that the contents would be revealed if and when it came time to fork over the money to the winner.

Even Griffin had slid in a wad of cash, though he hadn’t looked happy about it.

The fact was that Keith and Shiro’s game of unresolved sexual tension chicken was had already surpassed a 10.0 on the Richter Scale. It was like some sort of demented middle school dance where the two young lovers circled one another the entire time--except that their chaperone had long since grown tired of their bullshit and decided that even if they left it’s not like those two would be fucking in a broom closet any time soon if left to their own devices. That would be far too merciful a fate for everyone involved.

Matt had put 100 on them taking another five years to get their shit together, “they’ve known each other for….at least five years--on their timeline anyways-- and they’re still Like This. So. Yeah. We’re in this for the long haul.”

After that were a lot of groans and shots and other things that no one remembered--or at least pretended they didn’t.

"I don't trust him."

“Don’t trust what?”

“His Dmitiri from Anastasia hair, his cocky attitude, his sim scores, his _everything_ ,” Lance says, waving his arms.

Veronica sits, a look of realization dawning on her face. “I can’t believe I never put that together--”

“Yes thank you, Veronica--”

“--he looks _exactly_ like Dmitri from Anastasia. Wow.”

“Okay I take it back, you’re not helping.”

//

Also not helping: Shiro and Keith continuing to make the rest of the paladins party to their protracted and annoying mating rituals. It’s not even one step forward and two steps back, it’s a million steps towards one another while pretending all the while that the distance between their bodies has remained absolutely the same.

The lingering shoulder touches have undergone their chrysalis transformation into lingering _lower back_ touches. And Shiro and Keith, deluding themselves. Thinking that the object of their affections doesn’t see their game. Absolutely everyone else around them can see where the chess pieces on the board are heading.

People say that the eyes are the window to the soul, but; with the amount of longing, lingering looks and sheer denial between the two of them, it’s clear that Shiro and Keith have their blinds firmly drawn.

(“Something something, that’s not the only firm thing, something something,” Veronica says. Lance looks both horrified and proud.

“Ten GAC on them giving each other ‘platonic’ hand jobs before they confess,” Rizavi says. And well, when you’re right you’re right. Pidge would know, she’s always right.

“You think this is bad, try living on a spaceship with them and only four other people,” Pidge says. And Lance sympathizes. The things they’ve seen. “And if there’s one thing I found while traveling the galaxy it's that dick jokes are universal.” Though with Keith and Shiro it’s more like _why aren’t you getting on that dick_ jokes.

Matt pretends to wipe a tear from his eye, “they grow up so fast.” )

By the time the lot of them head out to the desert, half the group thinks Keith and Lance are some sort of rivals to lovers story cruelly interrupted by Captain Shirogane. The other have are begging Keith and Shiro to put everyone out of their misery and either fuck or get a room so they can fuck. It’s not clear if the sexual tension is a sheet of ice waiting to crack or if their relationship constantly operates at the level of “take me now.”


End file.
